"keurig" poems
Dark and ordinary mornings start,
with haptic taps from my Apple watch,
and a yawning stretch, way before dawn.
I glance out my window, to check
the weather because that’s the spec
that decides whether, we’re outside
or we’re down to the gym inside.
“Alexa, brew,” I compel my AI
thank God, she understands,
and my Keurig gurgles to life.
I brush the ‘ol tusks and wash my face,
before wiggling into spandex and taking a place
on the bench by the door where our shoes are stored.
When Lisa comes out, stout coffee in hand
she slumps on the bench, with a sleepy pout.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she confides with a yawn,
“I barely closed my eyes - then it was dawn!”
Checking my watch, I haven’t the heart
to say ‘dawn’s a half hour after we start.’
Every morning we rise and jog a five K (3.1mi)
we decided, last year, that it’s the best way
to jump-start our brains and start our day.
Poets write about love, pure and chaste,
and less about morning alarms and toothpaste
but in these moments, the ways we start our day,
can influence our lives in interesting ways
Oct 26, 2023
Oct 26, 2023 at 4:03 PM UTC
Coffee, I adore thee,
somehow you never bore me.
Bold and dark or mild and smooth,
you get me up and on the move.
In warm embrace or cool frappe,
mocha, french roast, or tall latte,
crema, sospeso or con panna,
you never fail to make my day.
It’s the best thing ever manufactured,
without it, my mind is slow and scattered,
for a quiz or formulating I’d be knackered,
every morning the Keurig is where we gather.
You pick me up and keep me keen,
in complementing any cuisine,
by delivering a dose of sweet caffeine,
you are the original magic bean.
In doses quick or lingered over,
on mornings with a hangover,
I reach for you, your warm embrace,
the morning fogginess to erase.
The flavors, the scent, which is the best?
They are of compound interest.
French press or espresso - take your pick
- they all provide that delicious kick.
Jitter juice, rocket fuel, cup of joe,
cuppa, morning brew or ristretto,
your flavors please, your scent rouses,
a coffee shop is where the crowd is.
In slang they call it Mormon-crack,
but sugared up or with a snack,
with creamy art or straight-up black
once I’ve got it, you won’t get it back.
Jan 27, 2023
Jan 27, 2023 at 9:27 AM UTC
Keep-A-Breast
Apple
OtterBox
Acu-Rite
Dial Aquafresh
Oral-B
ACT Garnier Equate
Hanes
On the Byas
Rude
Toms
Dakine
Acu-Vue
Ponds Degree
Preferred Stock
Mighty Wallet
Hot Topic
Keurig Dixie
Donut Shop
Domino
International Delight
Peter Paul's
Best Yet Great Value
Instagram
Facebook
Snapchat Yik Yak
Forever 21
Adventure Time
FSC Bic The Poetry Foundation
Staedtler Pilot Sharpie Microsoft
The Norton Anthology
Toshiba Dell Expo
Lipton
Emerica
Anti Hero MOB Shorty's
Bones Thunder
Shake Junt
Swingline
Pandora
Tommy Hilfiger
' Jill Greg Ashley Courtney
Judy
Bob
Janice
Shannon Kelly
Robert Emily Jeremy Darrin Liza
Bill Joe Dominic Sean James
Gav Jordan Tony Eric
Christopher
Dec 6, 2014
Dec 6, 2014 at 8:38 PM UTC
I thought I could purge all the flowers and metaphors trapped inside my rib cage with stems tickling my esophagus.
Blooming on the tip of my tongue, teeth locked them in but finger allowed escape.
Hand prying its way through my mouth, I wished to pull out my intestines and allow the stitches holding me together unravel.
Beauty doesn't thrive in an abandoned building so I let them free, no sense carrying casualties in a house destined to burn.
I remember the first time I prayed to the porcelain throne, begging for salvation.
A feeling manifested in my stomach and infected each vein, it swam through bone marrow leaving behind a trail of decay.
My framework was rotting and mind consumed, knees fell to the ground and I prayed for forgiveness, acceptance and peace.
Every time I vomited I felt one step closer to heaven, as if entrance to the gate had weight restrictions.
You stepped on a scale before they sewed on your wings, for all angels have to be pristine and my soul carried the weight of an eternity of mistakes.
I was a coward hiding behind a romanticized disorder to avoid reality.
The light has grown within, it keeps my food safely in my stomach lining and let's my words out,
A lesson I've been unable to face for years.
I remember the day I was diagnosed with EDNOS.
Eating disorder not otherwise specified.
I wanted to punch the specialist in the face with my emaciated knuckles for degrading the massacre I instilled on my body.
Not bulimia. Not anorexia. Not specified.
She tied me to a label that said the years I dedicated to restrictions and malnutrition and stomach acid dissolving the very foundation of my teeth meant nothing.
**** your dsm 5th edition and the ****** waiting room keurig green tea with low calorie sweetener you provided for each session.
I found a reason to live within myself.
Apr 8, 2014
Apr 8, 2014 at 1:23 PM UTC
It’s December and my roommates and I are deeply into Christmas. We’ve got a little 3ft tall Christmas tree with about fifty-thousand little multicolor LED lights on it (LEDs because we ARE saving the planet). We’re in the ‘study period’ right before finals and It’s a lowkey Saturday night.
Lisa and I were pajama’d and gelaxing in our suite’s common room. She was in a tan easy chair and I was slouched on our red corduroy couch, my slippered feet up on a white coffee table. We had a Christmas playlist playing throughout the suite, a ‘Christmas lights of Paris’ Youtube video streaming silently on our TV and cups of Keurig brewed hot-chocolate with little marshmallows.
Leong came out of her room and joined us, taking a seat on the far side of the couch with me. After a moment she stretched-out, putting her head in my lap. I love her jet-black, cornsilk hair and it wasn’t long before I found myself stroking it, a gesture primates have been making since the pleistocene period. When Lisa glanced over at us and smiled, I started making gestures like I was looking for fleas in her hair and eating them - in a silly, momentary comedy lost on Leong.
We got back from November recess a few days ago. After three years together, it was easy, almost automatic, for us to fall back in our rhythms as roommates. On arrival, I glanced through my drawers, ***** clothes and shelves, taking a casual inventory. Everything was as I remembered it but still, everything had the feel of trivial leftovers from some lost civilization.
I got a new M3-iMac, it’s really the best platform for putting docs side by side. The first thing I did was hit ‘restore my setup’ from the cloud. I love futzing with tech - I can remember when that kind of restoration would have taken all day - but fifteen minutes later I could tell from the files on my desktop that everything was restoring nicely.
As I sat back on my office chair watching the restoration, I felt myself relax. THIS was real life, this was how life should be done. No matter what else I’d done or where else I’d gone - this was how my life should be - at school, with friends, facing those challenges. It was a peek-moment.
It was an illusion that my little iMac welcomed me back, like an old friend, as it finished restoring - wasn’t it?
Dec 5, 2023
Dec 5, 2023 at 10:30 AM UTC
The alarm interrupted my sleep with the urgency of lust
or sudden inheritance - only to end up being neither.
“Alexa, good morning,” I say, as I stretch. My room lights illuminate - in red mode - like a submarine lit for night routine and my Keurig springs to life.
How could someone living my dull, slow, academic life be so walking-dead tired in the morning? After all I got - trying to focus on my tiny Apple watch - 4 hours sleep. I rubbed my dry eyes and auroras traveled across my lids.
When I pull open my drapes, all I see is a waning moon suggesting light to a dark world. I step around abandoned clothes, lying where they fell like soldiers.
Aggk! I recoil when I see a three-day-old corpse in the mirror.
Ugh, gross, I fell asleep wearing my ****** detox mask.
My clock reads 5:40am. I whisper to my AI, “Alexa, what’s today’s forecast?” “Currently, It’s 21°, today will be sunny with a high of 27°” she whispers back.
In a moment of non assignment related forethought, while tooth brushing, I strip my pillowcase, tossing it on a pile of ***** clothes next to the full hamper of equally ***** clothes.
MattyBRaps begins throbbing “Little Bit” in the room next door. That means Leong’s awake - she’s obsessed with a 15 year old boy-singer on Youtube.
I wiggle into my spandex, grab my iPad and water bottle, then head down to the basement gym. I can replay my chemistry class while walking on the treadmill.
Good morning.
Feb 9, 2022
Feb 9, 2022 at 6:00 AM UTC
Please Pogo music, wake me up. The night, now reduced to warm laptop light, is inching toward dawn. I pray to the patron saints of writers - is it Neri or Ávila? Whichever is on call I suppose.
“I’ve indulged in reprobation,” I confess, openly to the fuzzy, waxing, crescent moon. “I need that alchemy that turns coffee and a rough outline into an actual paper.”
I yank off my hoodie, fling my window open wide and hang myself out like wet laundry. Have you ever tasted ***** Vile stuff really.
The forty degree breeze feels like heaven and my eyes begin to focus. I peel off my leggings to let my entire skin tingle with cold.
My Keurig beeps confidently. I found a couple of peanut energy bars in my bookbag and rip them open like a ****** who’s discovered a forgotten stash. I devour them so quickly it’s like a magic trick - then I brush my teeth.
I take several slow deep breaths. I can DO this, I assure myself, but my outline looks adequate at best. I need this done so I can relax with a super bowl party pizza Sunday.
The song “Data & Picard,” sets me to dancing, “It’s better to have loved and lost..” Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard pronounces, perfectly auto-tuned to the music.
I love this song. I love the night. I love the challenge.
I set myself to the task and finish, three hours later, as the sun breaks into morning.
Feb 12, 2022
Feb 12, 2022 at 7:28 AM UTC
There's a huge bean bag in the corner
the color of rusted tree
and a white painted outline to hold two drawers
of colorful condoms next to the Keurig Machine.
Three circular winded fanciful lights strung above,
shedding semicircular splotches on the walls.
Looking out on the Brooklyn Bridge in the 1893
painted on in black and grey haunts.
There's a magnetic pillar to the left of the too-deep chairs
that at least are comfortable,
but no one has legs that long.
A magazine rack to the right lends a variety of color, from
Love Match to Lavender, it's a mismatch island.
Smells like plastic and a cold air, with a hint of college sweat.
And there's the squeaky roller chair full of business textbooks and drawings of pigeons and bitten fingernails and arms that lead to the edges of the paper.
Masked with worn All Star sketchers and three clocks ticking,
Long labored skies and horcruxes gathered round the edges.
Yet somehow with all the oddities combined,
it's safe and sound under the flag including.
Sep 21, 2018
Sep 21, 2018 at 4:03 PM UTC
I feel like I have lost my ability to create images;
Those truly magical ones that can be read in a year or two when I feel this way again.
A sentence or a word that will usher up in me some spark to light fire in my pen
and take to the pages like some ravish creature.
Some days, the not so bad but oh so normal ones,
I stare at this notebook and pray divine intervention again, as if I know He bores of me too.
“Good morning, help me find my escape from my own head or else I may truly lose my mind”
Most days, like today, I sit in solitude and wait;
Sipping through my teeth the brisk morning air and hot sour coffee,
perfectly made by my perfectly placed Keurig
and doodle line for line-
Life has become some mediocre muse at best.
Jan 20, 2015
Jan 20, 2015 at 1:44 PM UTC
The phone rings,
Or rather vibrates,
As I stir my instant coffee
Because my Keurig is broken
And I haven’t gotten around to replacing it.
The lady on the other end
Of the call
Says she’s with the bank.
She’s selling identity theft protection subscriptions.
I listen to her
Explain
What that is
With mild excitement growing in my stomach;
Not with regards to the
Subscription,
But over the
Tones and intonations —
The way she breathes:
Softly,
Warmly,
Unconsciously.
I let her run with it,
Feigning curiosity at first.
A question here,
There,
To really get her going.
I wonder when she was last ******
She asks to verify my name,
Address.
She mentions a credit score package
(Ooh la la)
That will provide me with insight as to whether my identity has ever been
Stolen.
(This call
Is getting steamy)
She tells me that in order to receive the package I need to confirm my enrolment in the subscription.
‘What?
Could you repeat that?’
I can feel it
Tickling,
Licking,
My soul,
As I sip my ****** instant coffee.
I tell her
That I absolutely won’t enrol,
That I refuse,
But that she should be a voice actor
Or that if she was a voice option for Siri
I would surely select her.
She doesn’t have a response,
Choosing to wish me a good evening instead,
And to thank me on behalf of her employer.
‘No,
Thank you dear.
Call this number whenever you like.
I don’t want your talents to go unappreciated by other customers
Who I’m sure are all swines.’
Click.
I stare at the ended call
And fantasize about your voice,
And when you were last ******
Too bad the coffee is ****
Dec 5, 2019
Dec 5, 2019 at 10:14 PM UTC
August 19, 2015
The question keeps occurring, "Why am I sitting here at my computer, trying to come up with an idea on which to write?" After all, it's only 4:30 a.m. and the coffee has already become too cold, so "Hello, Keurig, again!"
On the screen, a still photo of my grand-daughter Emily, in the kitchen of her home, dancing with a broom, while supposedly sweeping the floor. It was Christmas Day, 2014. It's currently my profile photo.
(Excuse me while I go warm up a donut)
"I'm back." Don't know where her older brother, Evan, was at that moment, probably in the den putting together another "Star Wars" LEGO set he got for Christmas. He has most of them. By the way, Christmas 2015 is right around the corner, and don't forget that "Talk Like a Pirate Day" arrives next month on September 19.
"Yea, I know what you're thinking. "
copyright: richard riddle-August 19, 2015
Aug 19, 2015
Aug 19, 2015 at 5:40 PM UTC
I love
My little room
Entire silvered by dawn.
Tossing into trash bin
Yesterday’s coffee pod
I toss out yesterday’s cares.
Inserting a new pod
I turn the page
Of my small life.
As the Keurig brews
That first cup
It sounds a shush:
Quiet be, still be, just be
Look at the cedars and firs
Glowing with the
Fire of God.
So I sip
Coffee and chill morning air
And rock my rocking chair
To the rhythm
Of birds at the feeder
All else can wait
Sep 19, 2025
Sep 19, 2025 at 9:39 PM UTC
(a disastrous morning Sonnet)
I am the very model of a girl who’s late for morning meal,
my charger failed, the printer jammed, the morning’s start has been surreal
I lost a scrunchy and a shoe, I had to use some dry shampoo
my Keurig had no k-cups too, I’m feeling like a total shrew!
Our pre-dawn jog went really well, but now the morning's gone to hell
I couldn’t find clean underwear, I’m desperate to charge my cell,
I got some soap in my left eye, I stubbed my toe and nearly cried
While brushing teeth and hair in haste, I wonder why I even try.
Anna’s got an attitude, she’s not someone who’s normally rude
her hookup so ‘experimental’ has an irregular sleep-in schedule
how’s she going to get to class if she’s babysitting sleeping-lass
I guess I’m not the only one, who’s schedules simply come undone.
I woke her with a gentle voice and soothed her out—we had no choice
My morning happened to sideways go—but it fueled this grandiloquent tale of woe!
.
.
A song for this:
Something Stupid by Michael Bublé and Reese Witherspoon
Nov 17, 2024
Nov 17, 2024 at 9:24 PM UTC
I woke up on my comfortable Sealy mistress
And turned of the alarm on my Apple iPhone 6
I walk into the kitchen and turn on my Keurig machine
And I put in my Dunkin Donuts medium roast coffee
I set my Starbucks coffee mug beneath it
As its filled with two teaspoons of C&H; sugar
I turn on my widescreen HD LG television
And start up my Amazon Kindle Fire HD tablet
I order some Dominoes pizza for delivery
And put in a Walt Disney movie
I proceed to drift to sleep on my JC Penny's couch
And I dream that I am nothing but a sellout
Dec 12, 2016
Dec 12, 2016 at 12:08 AM UTC
Lost lines, resisted in the night,
conscious resistance in the night,
not sleeping, so
not dreaming,
certain this
is real.
Now it is day, and I call the thieves,
again, all ye, all ye outs, inscape
the outer darkness, pitch me your plot,
show me what you got,
series of forties. Days and Nights,
rain and fasting, days and years,
forty steps and forty miles
forty winks and forty minutes,
ten fingers clapping four hands.
all nonsense compared
to the work of forty thieves.
We had something adding up,
before surrendering to sleep.
The universe was taking shape,
it made all the sense in the world,
for a while.
Time set, 9:17 and the first direct
sunlight pierces the oak and dapples my room,
as I have no complaints,
I have no room to boast
of tuffing my way past losing
anything, from where I sit this morning,
life on this pilgrimage, if we agree,
pilgrimage is
not religion, not new age of water
and fire working in tandem to make us
serve the dams and serve the fires,
drive the engines and prune the trees,
shear the sheep and **** the calves,
and milk the cows,
grind the grains and knead the dough,
think in tiny sticky sensory arrays pointing
soft from sharp and hard, feeling fit
loose or tight,
these bonds,
this time, … my frosty morning,
not cold enough for a fire,
I’ll use that consumption knack,
thus loosing
another half-dozen Keurig cups,
for the seals and whales who are
building an unsinkable plastic refuge
for the polar bears to use,
after the Northwest Passage is open year round.
9:31…
Beyond the palisade,
out yonder,
over yonder, where the line is drawn
on the wall of our valley,
where each high water winter left a line,
bearing witness, to the saying,
" surely we live on the wreck of a world"
and surely it was no work of our own,
especially,
now, pinch a little thought, any point
that feels
just right, a child laughing - random that.
Stretch it out.
If this happens to be forty lines long,
abstracted, pulled into your time from mine,
that’s fine at 9:42, I have two minutes to make it so.
Or let it go. And go see what is so funny
at the breakfast table.
Oct 30, 2022
Oct 30, 2022 at 1:00 PM UTC